


Ticks

by Raccoonfg



Category: Zootopia (2016)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-01
Updated: 2017-12-01
Packaged: 2019-02-09 05:15:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,578
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12880911
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Raccoonfg/pseuds/Raccoonfg
Summary: Judy Hopps has a problem...





	Ticks

It was at about ten after eight, while getting dressed, that Judy Hopps first became aware of it.

At first it wasn’t considered much of a bother; more of a peculiarity, really. And after a brief glance over her modest broom closet of an apartment, she shrugged and left for work, chalking it up to one of many issues that came with living in an older building.

But as her day went forward, it did not pass and clearly had little to do with her apartment, which was now far behind her as she sat in the ZPD’s briefing room while her ears fretfully twitched with steadily increasing annoyance.

It was getting to her so much that before embarking on her patrol with Nick, she immediately made a sharp detour to the locker room and proceeded to undress, redress, undress, and redress again, only to reluctantly leave unsatisfied and repeatedly tugging at her uniform in some feigned hope that it might make a difference, no matter how unlikely that was the case.

By the time she and her partner had hit the road, the constant presence of it was practically maddening. As her paws rested against the cruiser’s steering wheel, her fizzy little fingers repeatedly drummed against the leather surface in timing with the rhythmic irritation that invaded her. It was getting to a point that with nearly every stop at a traffic sign she would lean over to the radio and gradually increase the volume, tick by tick, trying desperately to distract herself from the unavoidable.

Unsurprisingly, this did not go unnoticed by Nick.

“You, ah, been hitting the bean juice a little hard lately?”

“Huh?”

“You seem kinda… ‘Fidgety’ today,” he clarified, tilting his shades to get a clearer look at her. “More than usual.”

“What? No, no, I’m fine,” Judy replied assuringly through gritted teeth while her ears fluttered like a moth dancing on a light bulb.

“You sure about that?”

Realizing that there was little point in avoiding the matter, Judy rigidly sighed.

“Okay Nick, you’re right, I have a problem.”

“With coffee?”

“No. Ticks.”

To her dismay, Nick’s immediate response was that of repulsion as he instantly scooted as close as he possibly could to the surface of the car door, putting as much distance between him and her that he could manage.

“Ugh! No,” Judy groaned. “I didn’t mean that. I mean-- It’s a ticking. Like a noise.”

“Oh.” Quickly relaxing, Nick resumed his proper place in his seat and regained his composure. “So, what, did you swallow a watch or something?”

“No Nick, I did not swallow a watch.”

Judy almost preferred Nick cowering in fear of parasites.

“Maybe it’s the weather,” Nick offered with a shrug. “Sometimes my jaw clicks when it gets cold out.”

“It’s not a clicking, it’s a ticking,” Judy clarified. “And no, it’s not my jaw, or any of my joints, or my uniform, or my sinuses, or tinnitus, or--”

“Well shoot, I was gonna guess tinnitus next, given that those big ears of yours.”

“Well it isn’t that.”

They continued to drive in silence for a few moments after that, while various parts of Judy’s body spasmed in sync with what Nick now realized to be the tempo of a common clock and eventually he chose to speak up again.

“Well, whatever it is, it’s all in your head, Carrots, because I can’t hear a lick of it.”

Judy didn’t reply. All she did was sit there as her right eyelid shuddered and leaned over to raise the radio volume another notch the moment they stopped at a red light.

As the day progressed, Nick avoided bringing the issue back up again and did his best to ignore the symptoms of Judy’s problem, much in the same way that she tried to ignore the cause. But it was evident that things were not getting better for her, no matter how much they tried to sweep it under the rug.

It would all finally come to a head sometime late in the afternoon while they were on call to respond to the report of a robbery.

As Nick was taking a statement from the shopkeeper, Judy stood by with her pen and notepad, recording the details. Despite the aproned goat being a bit shaky in his recollection of the thief’s description, the interview was going pretty smoothly. However, the longer they discussed the crime, the more Nick started to hear an incessant clicking.

Half worried that he had caught Judy’s ‘ticks’, he glanced over at his partner and found that she was tensely pressing and depressing the top of her pen, over and over.

Tick, tick, tick, tick.

And while that should have come with some relief for him, he had also noticed that the open page of her notepad was blank. No notes. Just dabs of ink jotted all over where the tip of her pen was relentlessly jabbing into the paper.

Tick, tick, tick, tick.

With a frustrated sigh, Nick asked the witness to hold on a moment and ushered Judy aside.

“Okay, this has to stop, Judy.”

“It’s fine, Nick,” she replied unconvincingly. “I’m fine.”

There was no question that she wasn’t fine in the least as she gazed up at him with her big watery eyes while her buck teeth clacked against the bottom row of pearly whites in the same mechanical measure.

“No, you’re not fine. You just blew half an hour of testimony over a noise that’s in your imagination.”

“I’m not imagining it, it’s--”

“You are, Judy,” Nick sharply cut her off and then calmly softened his tone, “And I get it. I really do. Listen, I know you don’t think me or anyone else at the station notices it, but you push yourself too hard. And eventually that sort of thing gets to you. You might lose sleep, or start feeling faint, or even--”

“Start hearing things.”

Nodding, Nick placed his paw on Judy’s shoulder.

“How about you take a moment to work things out while I retake this guy’s statement?”

“Y-yeah, sure, Nick.”

Ashamed in herself, Judy wobbled off towards a nearby bench and climbed up it, taking a seat, while the ceaseless ticking dutifully followed her like a pet frog on a string. And as she slumped against the bench’s oversized wood slats, Judy focused her eyes on the hustle and bustle around her in an attempt to drown out the noise within.

A baby elephant holding trunks with her mother as they browsed the fruit stands.

A group of yaks gabbing over coffee on a café patio.

A pine marten lovingly tending to a flowerbed of lilies.

All of them seemed to be at ease and content in their lives; entirely in control and moving at their own pace. And most of all, undaunted by ticking.

Nick wasn’t entirely wrong; Judy had been giving well past one hundred and ten percent at work lately. If there was a call for undercover work or a stakeout shift, she was first to volunteer, regardless of whether or not Nick was willing or available to join her and especially in spite of any double shifts she may have been working the day prior.

But how could she not? She was Officer Judith Laverne Hopps. She busted two major conspiracies in her first year as a police officer. She was an icon to all mammals who never realized they could achieve beyond their expectations. To just do the baseline amount of work that was expected of her and call it a day was practically squandering all she worked for, all she stood for.

And yet…

And yet here she sat, watching everyone else blissfully doing nothing more than what was expected of them, enjoying their lives without shame, while she had to endure a mind-numbing ticking in her brain.

And what of her coworkers that she sought to over achieve? They weren’t doing any more, nor were they doing any less. They were all doing their equal part in accomplishing the same goal; to make the city a better, safer place for everyone. If they all pushed themselves as far as Judy did it wouldn’t have made things better, all it would have done was result in an entire police force burnt out and useless to rise to the call when it really mattered.

Just like she had.

Sighing at the ink speckled page of her notebook, Judy looked over at Nick who was calmly speaking with the agitated witness. She always saw him as being too laid back and slow to act, but now she thought she could appreciate what he was really doing; not sweating the small stuff so that he can handle the big issues when they happen.

Maybe it wasn’t too late to change her attitude and try things his way for a change.

Take each day as they come.

Smell the roses a little.

“Yeah, Nick is right,” she said, smiling to herself, “It’s all in my head.”

And in that little, glimmering epiphany Judy finally found herself at ease.

Her head was clear.

Her body relaxed.

Her mood uplifted.

But most of all, the ticking had finally stopped.

Hopping off the street-side bench, Judy skipped towards her partner with a big, bright smile on her face.

“Hey Nick, you were right,” she called, “No more ticking.”

And it was at that moment, in a tremendous, ear-shattering burst, Officer Judith Laverne Hopps spontaneously exploded.


End file.
